


Reaching Dreams

by Cluegirl



Series: Bei Mir Bist du Schon [1]
Category: The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Angsty Schmoop, Established Relationship, F/M, Fix-It, M/M, Multi, PWP without Porn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-01
Updated: 2013-07-01
Packaged: 2017-12-16 19:10:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/865559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cluegirl/pseuds/Cluegirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve's worst nightmares don't always make sense, but they always seem to involve somebody falling.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reaching Dreams

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bactaqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bactaqueen/gifts), [Merideath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merideath/gifts).



> I had a bad reaction to issue #8 of the latest Captain America. Bactaqueen and Merideath suggested this might make me feel better about things, and whadayaknow? They were right.

It's the twitching that wakes her – that, and the sound of pained, labored breathing, wrung so tight with anguish that each breath might as well be a sob. _Nightmare,_ that sound means; worse than usual.

Darcy picks her head up from the pillow and squints to her right. Steve's face is glossy with sweat in the orange city-light glow, his teeth clenched between lips pulled back in pain or fury, his hands gripping up brutal fistfuls of the mattress as he struggles. There are tears on his face.

"Steve?" Darcy murmurs, drawing a hand from under her pillow and reaching for his naked shoulder. 

"Don't," Buck hisses, lunging up against her back and reaching to catch her wrist, and only then does Darcy's sleep-hazed brain remember that they've _talked_ about this; how strong they both are now, how they can't help but wake up fighting when the dreams are on them, how she's a brilliant badass who rocks hardcore, but she is _not_ a supersoldier. She manages to pull up short just as Bucky's metal fingers close around her wrist, but it's already too late.

"IAN!" Steve screams, shoving up from the bed like he's throwing off the weight of the Helicarrier, and lunging one reaching arm over the edge of the bed. "NO!" 

Darcy yelps, lets Bucky pull her back hard against himself, but is too awkward, too tangled in the bedding when he tries to roll her over and put himself between them. A moment later, Steve lunges around, his eyes grief-wild and streaming as he catches Darcy by the shoulders and shoves her flat over just as if his best friend weren't pinned beneath her by the move. 

"How could you?!" he hisses, his knee a ton-weight of agony pinning the flesh of her thigh. "He's just a boy! Just a little boy!"

"Steve!" she yelps, trying to get her arms up, to pet, to soothe, to somehow reach him while Bucky swears in Russian and tries to slither out from under them both. From the corner of her eye, Darcy can see his metal arm gleaming as he tries to reach the bat down beside the bed. Steve's grip on her shoulders is beyond bruising tight – she's actually afraid for her collarbones at this point, but she makes herself keep her voice level and calm. "Steve, baby, it's a dream. It's just a dream, okay?"

"He wouldn't have hurt me He wasn't... He..." A true sob then, ragged and broken as she has never imagined her Super Soldier could be. "He's my..."

"Steven Grant Rogers, you wake the hell up, you hear me?!" Bucky grits out, and the blunt, pale wood of the slugger looms up out of the dark. "Don't you make me reset you."

"Buck, don't," Darcy cries, because terrible as it is to see the anguish and rage in Steve's eyes, she doesn't want to see their lover shed that precious blood. Especially when it's damn well GONNA wind up getting all over her in the process.

But Bucky ignores her, gives Steve's shoulder a solid, unforgiving thwack with the bat, and growls, "Don't make me learn ya, punk. Darcy couldn't hurt a fly, and you know it."

"Hey!" Darcy yelps. "I'm totally testing my next taser upgrade on your ass, Barnes!"

And that's what does it. Steve's hands clench, then release almost before the flash of pain registers through her adrenaline rush. His hands are still on her, heavy and solid with his considerable weight behind them, but he's just holding himself up now, blinking and confused. 

"Darcy?" he asks, sounding all of twelve. She can feel him starting to shake as she musters a smile.

"Well, I'm not the Easter Bunny," she offers, stroking the back of his arms – all she can reach, pinned where she is.

"And I'm not a goddamned featherbed, ya moron," Bucky growls, spitting her hair out of his mouth and giving Steve's shoulder another, gentler whack with the bat. "So how's about you let up a little, huh?"

Steve flinches at that, blinking harder, panting harder. "Bucky?" He lets go, sitting back onto his heels, and Darcy can't suppress the flinch as blood rushes back into the flesh where he'd been gripping her. "Oh Jesus," he whimpers from behind one hand as he scrambles from the bed.

Darcy follows, hands out, talking him down like she would a big, scared dog in the street. "It's fine, honey. Just fine, I promise. You were only dreaming, Steve – Steve!?"

But he's in the bathroom, door slammed and lock thrown before she can get even a step closer. A second later, the retching begins. Darcy can't help a little sympathy gag at the sound, and she's actually grateful when Bucky shoves her robe into her hands and orders her out of the bedroom. She's constitutionally unqualified to be the one holding her lover's hair out of the toilet, and they all know it. Best she can hope for is to retreat to the kitchen and get some cocoa going before the sound of Steve trying to turn himself inside out makes her upchuck where it'll be harder to clean up.

~*~

The bathroom lock hardly deserves the name. Bucky's picked it about two seconds after he hears the gas hob in the kitchen clicking to light. Steve, curled down tight around the john, doesn't even look up when he comes in, but there's a line of tension across his shoulders that quivers loose when Bucky lets his hand rest there.

The heaves don't last long. Steve's new, superefficient body doesn't like to give up food once it's got some, no matter how tainted, and apparently it thinks even less of giving up food when it's only shocked nerves behind the event. He sits back on his heels, panting, pale and sweaty, after only a few moments more, and flashes Bucky a grateful look when he puts a glass of water into his hand.

"Not the ice this time." Bucky doesn't bother to make it a question.

Steve spits the first mouthful of water into the toilet and presses the flush. "Worse," he mumbles before downing the rest of the glass.

"Is it that one where Stark's arc reactor opens up and it's full of little hairy blue guys with cheese on their heads?" Bucky takes the glass and runs it full again with a theatrical shudder. "Man, I hate that one. The bagpipes are the _worst_!"

But Steve isn't laughing. He's hiding his face, and the ribs pressed against Bucky's knees are trembling like he's running current under his skin, but amusement's got nothing to do with it. Bucky grabs a washcloth off the counter and runs it under the tap before he shuts it off, then wrings it out and coaxes Steve's hands away from his face. "You wanna tell me?" he asks, not because he wants to know, but in case Steve needs to say.

Steve shakes his head, the wet cloth pressed to his face with both palms for a long moment. Then he drags it down his throat, and around to drape over the back of his neck. "It was Zola," Steve says, and Bucky's guts lock up tight. He keeps it off his face, but he can tell from the half-guilty flicker of Steve's glance that it showed up in his eyes anyway.

"Okay," Bucky says. "Spill."

And Steve does. Even retold in a clipped, efficient debriefing monotone, it's a grisly hell of a dream, all but tailor-made to tromp on every one of Steve's worst memories, hopes, and fears. A son, a baby he raised alone in that hell of a world, gave his all to shield, shelter, keep safe, even though everything around them wanted to kill them both. It's so exactly what Steve would do, all the way through to the sickening, horrible end – the kid recovering his memories, fighting loose of the mind control just before he would have killed the person who loved him most in the world... Bucky has to take a deep breath at that, and in a way the utter nonsense of what falls out of Steve's mouth next is a Godsend of a distraction.

"Wait, Sharon?" he butts in. "Sharon who?"

Steve blinks, derailed. "Carter. Agent 13."

Bucky feels his eyebrows climb. "As in OUR Agent 13's _granddaughter?_ " he can't help laughing. "And you were thinkin' a marryin' her?" 'Cause _that's_ not creepy or anything. Steve's brows draw down fierce, and Bucky can see the dream clouding up in his eyes again, so he gives a nudge with his knee and grins. "Better not let Dollface hear that part. She hates Carter already."

Steve tilts his head back against Bucky's knee and sighs. "I know. Can't figure that out, Sharon seemed perfectly nice to me,"

"Bingo," Bucky observes, plucking the damp rag out from between them, and raking his fingers through Steve's already wild hair. "She gets much more perfectly nice, our favorite SHIELD admin might just take it into her head to arrange for Agent Carter to be on Kardashian bodyguard detail for the next decade."

"And don't think I can't do it, either," Darcy says, shouldering back the door and bringing three enormous mugs of cocoa into the bathroom. "It'd be double-points schadenfreude too, since blondie would be dodging cameras to try and maintain anonymity, but she'd be showing up the celebutards the entire time, and they'd totally know it. Plus, I'd pay good money to watch Kayne West try and mack on Agent Sunshine."

"Darcy, we talked about this," Steve says, trying not to smile, "House rule #3: don't be evil." 

She pouts in that way that always makes Bucky want to kiss it right off her, and hands him the biggest of the mugs, only a faint trace of cocoa visible beneath the floating marshmallows. "I wouldn't do it in the house," she complains, passing a mug to Bucky before invading his lap and bracing her bare feet on Steve's thigh. "And I could totally invoke the Service To Humanity and It Had To Be Done clauses on this too, so you'd better not push your luck, Blue-Eyes," she adds, reaching down to ruffle his hair and tipping a kiss on Bucky's cheek for good measure. "Now who wants waffles?"

Bucky looks at Steve, who's biting his lip, trying to choke down the urge to laugh. It's ridiculous, so Bucky gets them both started, wrapping both his arms around Darcy's waist as she huffs over the noise. "What? I'm a stress-feeder! What's wrong with that?" Which only makes them both laugh harder, which only makes her pretend to be even more annoyed.

"Oh, don't you even pretend front, you big fakers," she growls, poking futilely at Bucky's ribs in her eternal quest for a ticklish spot. "You both love it."

Bucky retaliates with far more success – she's wildly ticklish, as they all know. It's so unfair he almost feels guilty for it, or he would, if her squirming and squealing didn't rub some of his favorite parts of her against some of his favorite parts of himself. He's always been better with sensations than feelings, after all. "That's not all we love, bombshell," he growls in her ear as her cocoa sloshes wildly.

Steve's flinching back from the sticky fallout, but he's grinning now, the bleak grief cleared from his eyes to make way for the angel-faced devil Bucky remembers from their childhood years – the dare-anything blue as bright and dangerous as ever. Steve catches Darcy's flailing feet by the ankles – purely out of self-defense, obviously – and pins them down wide so he can roll to his knees between her spread thighs. "Darn tootin," he says, taking her cocoa away as Bucky grabs her wrists up high, and leaning close to lick off an escaped marshmallow that's tickling obscenely toward her cleavage. "Love you _much_ more than your darn waffles," he mumbles against her skin.

Darcy curses through a moan and wraps her legs around Steve's waist. Bucky can feel her arching her back to rub that amazing rack of hers against Steve's naked chest as he cleans the sticky drink from her skin with the kind of attention to detail that makes his battleplans own the field. "You're both bad, bad men," she grumbles, taking care to grind her rear just so against Bucky's lap. "And if you don't take me to bed right now, I'm going to tell everyone that you've turned to the dark side."

"Old news, sweetheart," Bucky grins, puffing her thick hair out of his way so he can have a taste of her neck too. "Your boy there's been a hell-raiser from the cradle on, and I should know – I took enough licks for him." He shivers a bit, feeling a familiar hand, broad and sure, traveling up his thigh as Steve meets him beside Darcy's ear for a kiss.

"That you did," he admits, palming a handful of Bucky through his shorts and grinning. "But if Sister Mary Frances couldn't convince anybody of it, I don't think Darcy stands a chance."

"Yeah, well I bet Sister Mary Frances didn't have Twitter," Darcy snipes back, lunging against Bucky's hold just far enough to take herself a bite of Steve's shoulder and dig in. 

And Bucky, who's hard-up and ready, and pleased as hell to be on board with this plan of Steve's, takes the opportunity to shift both Darcy's hands into one grip, freeing up a hand he can use to tilt Steve's face into the perfect angle for a good, hard kiss. When it breaks apart, all three of them are breathless, sweaty, and straining into each other, dream shadows and night terrors forgotten in the rising heat between them. 

"M'legs are goin' t' sleep," Bucky mumbles against Darcy's lips as she turns her head to demand her share of attention. 

"Not my fault, Barnes," she answers through a soft and merciless smile, "I voted for bed. You two voted for evil..."

"I vote for both," Steve interjects with a grin, and Bucky can feel him getting his feet under him, long legs bunching up from underneath. "Big fan of both, actually. Let's do both."

"If you princess-carry me one more time, Steven Grant Rogers, I swear I will END YOU!" Darcy yelps, tightening her legs around Steve's waist as he reaches back for her ankles again. "Who do you think I am, Iron Man?"

Bucky laughs out loud at that, and gives Steve the eyebrow. "Girl's got a point," he says.

"Girl looks nothing at all like Iron Man," Steve replies, his arms sliding between Bucky's stomach and Darcy's waist. 

"Thank God for small favors," Bucky agrees, and drops Darcy's hands onto Steve's shoulders so she can hang on as he stands. He stays put on the tub for a moment, enjoying the view of Darcy's panties, soaked through and stretched tight around Steve's gripping fingers. He stretches his tingling legs for a moment as Steve turns to go, Darcy clinging to him like a koala with decidedly indecent intentions. The view of Steve's ass through his lightweight summer sleep pants is just as stirring, after all.

Then he boosts himself up to follow, a little incredulous, as always, at his good luck – not at all he's survived, not at the incredible odds of his being here, now, breathing on his own – he saves those thoughts for the daytime. No, his night-time luck orbits this man he's loved longer than he can remember, and this woman they both adore, and the way they can all be here, like this, without jealousy, guilt, or fear tainting the air between them. Bucky would never have believed it possible as a kid, would never have deserved it as a young man, and probably doesn't deserve it now, but he'll be damned if that means he's gonna second-guess it now he's got it.

He laughs as Steve plucks Darcy from him and tumbles them both to the bed. She giggles delightedly, and the bed-springs howl. In a few minutes there's gonna be a broom thumping at the floor, but Bucky doesn't care. He likes to think of it as a neighborhood cheerleading squad applauding their performance – the Steinmans could use the inspiration anyway, he figures. The bed squeaks again as he crawls along Darcy's other side, nuzzling the velvet of her belly as Steve strips her camisole out of the way. 

"Hey Steve," he says, as she giggles against him and presses her foot up against his erection, "You want heads or tails, buddy?"

And Steve's hand meets Bucky's over the soft swell of Darcy's hip, their fingers tangling for a moment, tight and grateful. Then Steve's war-poster grin flashes in the gloom. "I'm a big fan of both, actually," he says. "Let's do both."

~*~

Later, they sleep beside him again, one on each side, sheltering him between them, as if their warmly sated bodies can keep the dreams away. But Steve doesn't sleep.

It's not that he's afraid the dream will return – its details are already fading, becoming ridiculous in the shadow of his well-earned endorphin buzz – it's that he wants, more than sleep, to feel _this_. This weight of his past, and his future bracing him between them, balancing him, warming the ice of loss and fear out of his bones so that he can _breathe_ again. He wants to feel the strength and softness of both under his hands, hear the gentle snores that both would fiercely deny when awake, to watch sleep strip away the armor of sass and savagery until both faces are nothing but innocent, nothing but beautiful, everything he would die to defend.

He'd rather stay awake in this moment, to remind himself that he _can_ be happy, that it _is_ allowed for the likes of him, and that despite every risk he takes, he can still have this simple, warm joy, so long as he has the courage to believe in it. That sometimes when he reaches for what's precious, it will _not_ be falling just out of reach. It's fragile, what they have; it's dynamic, and it's bound to change a million times, in a million ways before it's all through, but he's adaptable, he figures, and they – all three of them – are worth it.

They are worthy of each other. That's not a thing he cares to sleep through.


End file.
